thoughts from fcdc dancer Jessica de Leon

My parents put me in a ballet class when I was 4 years old. I remember seeing my older cousin perform in The Nutcracker and I wanted to be part of that world of sparkles and rhinestones and glitter. I've since out grown that. I've been dancing pretty consistently since then, taking only a short hiatus during my squirrely pre-teen years.

I didn't develop any strong feelings about dance until college. During my junior year as a dance major at Santa Clara University a professor challenged us with an interesting extra credit project: write a dance manifesto. I'm pretty sure I was the only person in the class who actually did the assignment. And most of what I came up with was total crap. But regardless, the process of writing my manifesto changed me as an artist. It forced me to sit down and actually put into words why I love dance.

Here are some parts that I don't think are crap:

"Dance has the power to change things, on both the micro and macro levels. I see dance  everywhere. Not just in the bodies of trained dancers, but in the people walking down the street and the smell of coffee wafting in the air. I see dance in the words people speak and in the silences where words need not be spoken. Dance is a passion and the medium which I choose to express my thoughts, opinions, and feelings.

"Dance is a spiritual act that brings a person’s body into communion with things that cannot be seen, only felt.
 

Photo by Joey Brennan

 

"Dance is a conversation. Whether it is between the dancer and the audience or the mover and the unknown there is dialogue that exists. Perhaps it calls our beliefs into question or enrages us to act or it simply fills us with joy. Despite the quality of the reaction, dance makes us feel something.
 

"Dance is community. In dancing with others we share a part of ourselves that goes beyond all that could ever be said. The Hopi Indians say that 'To see us dance is to hear our hearts speak.' And dancing alone allows us to reveal ourselves in an intimate and uncensored way. Dance can bring people together when the world and its human insufficiencies have torn them apart. 

"Dance is movement. Movement is dance. They cannot be separated. And there is beauty in that relationship, that tension. The world is not still or stagnant.  Movement is constant and ever present. An English teacher once told me, 'Without the push and pull of life, there is no movement.'

"Creativity and imagination propel the art of dance in to a realm beyond definitions or explanations. And that is why it is beautiful. And that is why everyone should dance."

Since I've started law school, my perspective on the world has definitely changed. This includes my thoughts on dance and art. But that might be fodder for another blog post :)